Plastic Drying Drums

Overview:

E Tube & Wire helped a customer with a drying drum that is 6′ diameter and 10′ long, weighing almost one thousand pounds. This drum is used to roll the plastic in front of infrared light drying it to and below the industry standard of -40 degrees dew point. As the drum rolls the plastic moves through it while tumbling through a spiral or flights. These drums are only used in very high volume applications for large companies such as 3M. The plastic needs to be dry to ensure when it’s molded or blown that no moisture causes steam which then can form holes or voids in the end product. Plastic water bottles go through this process before being formed to ensure there aren’t any holes.

E Tube & Wire engineers were able to take a rough sketch that was provided and turned it into large stainless weldments for the process. Our welders worked closely with the designer to create a part that fit their need and had the strength to run for years. Our welders developed a set of safety procedures and fixtures to be able to work in the confined space.

As part of E Tube & Wire’s quality control system, extensive measuring is conducted and small fixtures are developed to line up individual parts. Quality is ensured by the operators measuring several times, and utilizing their extensive fabricating skill and experience. All of E Tube & Wire’s welders are certified to AWS and AWB specifications and some have over 30 years of experience.

The customer did extensive testing upon arrival to check concentricity or the fact that its round. If it’s not round the drum will walk or move and wear out bearings and bearing surfaces.

E Tube & Wire has made similar drums for multiple industries and has well over 10 years of experience in this application. Plastics drying drums are almost identical to parts washing drums that the company has fabricated for many years.